Dumplings with Elizabeth

Posted: Tue 01 Feb 2011 | Elizabeth Chong

Elizabeth Chong, a multi award winning media personality, celebrity chef, author and teacher, embraces the many aspects of food both in Australia and overseas. She is an authority on Chineses and Asian cuisine and regularly leads culinary tours into Asia in conjunction with Helen Wong's Tours.

Shanghai dumplings - Freshly made on the streets.

Elizabeth loves the Chinese dumpling, for more reasons than one. For it was Elizabeth’s father – William Wing Young – who was the first commercial manufacturer of what is now an Australian icon – the Dim Sim

The history of the Wing Lee Dim Sim dates back to the war years when, in 1942, he introduced it as a means of engaging unemployed older Chinese men into an enterprise “to earn a small substance income”.

“All my life I have been in awe of Chinese food. I respect Chinese Master Chefs for their exceptional skills in preparing the most delicious food in the world and their appreciation of how to create the most wonderful dishes from a seemingly boundless array of ingredients. I love their artistry, their dedication, agility and speed with the knives and their confidence with the wok.”

Today, a great number of Australian restaurants employ highly-qualified Dim Sum chefs, two of Elizabeth’s favourite restaurants being the Shanghai House in Melbourne’s Chinatown and the East Imperial in Melbourne’s Carlton.

Seasoning -

Preparation -

1. Mix mince filling in a bowl, add seasoning. It is a good idea to chill the filling for at least 30 minutes before wrapping.

2. Hold a wrapper in the palm of your left hand, place one tablespoon of filling in the centre of the wrapper. Wrap the sides up and around squeezing the skin close to the filling. The top of the wrapper gathers naturally into pleats. Gently push the filling down from the top to pack the 'flower pot' firmly and top up with extra filling if needed. The filling should be seen above the wrapper. Flatten the bases slightly and place over boiling water in a lightly-oiled bamboo basket or a lightly-oiled plate or cake pan on a steaming rack. Steam for 15-20 minutes. Serve with a dip of soy sauce and sesame oil (2 parts soy sauce to 1 part sesame oil).

Points of interest -

Aluminium steamers, like the bamboo basket steamers, are very useful for steaming Chinese dumplings. The bottom part of the steamer is half filled with boiling water and the first and second tiers are filled with perforated racks. You can stack the dumplings straight on to these racks to steam.

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